Two foreigners among five killed in attacks on hotel, department stores

Five people were killed and about 60 injured in a series of six explosions in Hat Yai's business centre last night. The blasts went off at two shopping malls, one of the city's biggest hotels and three other locations.

Witnesses said the bombs went off at roughly five-minute intervals starting at around 9pm, when the area was crowded with tourists and locals going out to dine and for night entertainment.

Two of the dead were foreigners - one Chinese and one Westerner. The injured were sent to nearby hospitals including Raj Yindee Hospital, Krungthep-Hadyai Hospital and Songkhla Nakharin Hospital.

The first bomb to go off was on Thammanoon Withi Road, at the entrance to a pub called Deep Wonder in the basement of the Odean Shopping Mall. The second bomb went off at a junction a few hundred metres down the road, and the third one another few hundred metres on.

The fourth bomb went off in front of the Lee Garden Hotel, destroying tuk-tuks parked there.

The fifth explosion was at the Big C Supercentre and the last was in a restroom of a movie theatre on the fifth floor of Diana Shopping Centre.

The bombs damaged a numbers of cars and motorcycles in the vicinity.

Police said each blast had a radius of 20 metres and that they had found pieces of metal suspected to be part of the bombs.

Officials believe the bomb at the Odean Shopping Mall was planted inside a motorcycle and detonated by mobile phone. Soon after the explosions, all unattended motorcycles nearby were moved away and people were evacuated from the area for fear of more explosions.

Thammanoonwithi Road is one of the most crowded roads in Hat Yai City, with more than 10 hotels along its length. More than 1,000 tourists, both Thais and foreigners, were checked in at the hotels. All were evacuated.

Senior Police Officer Ongkorn Thongprasom said police had received reports that such bomb attacks were likely between September 16 and 20.

"After this bombing, we have to seriously discuss security measures for the area. For sure, the impact on tourism will be large," he said.

Just two weeks ago, intelligence officials predicted stronger, more vigorous attacks by militants in the deep South between September 16 and 20 since this is the week to celebrate the setting up of the Pattani Islamic Mujahideen and Pattani State.

Srisompob Jitpiromsri, an academic who studies trends in the insurgency, said after a spate of bombings in Yala two weeks ago that the insurgents would continue to "show their force" through more coordinated, simultaneous attacks.

Charred vehicles stand outside a drinking hall in front of the Odean Shopping Mall, one of six places in Hat Yai that were bombed last night. Officials believed the explosives were planted in a motorcycle.

Scene ... burnt out vehicles at the scene where up to six bombs were detonated / Reuters

Confusion over injured Aussie

September 17, 2006 06:53pm

THERE was confusion tonight over whether an Australian tourist was among those injured when six simultaneous bombs tore through a popular tourist area in southern Thailand.

Media reports had earlier suggested an Australian was among dozens wounded in the blasts which struck the Hat Yai region during the busy Saturday night period. Four people died in the attacks.

The Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade tonight said there were no Australians reported in local hospitals and the Australian Embassy in Bangkok advised there were no reports of any Australian fatalities.

He said the reportedly injured Australian had also not requested consular assistance.

But an Australian visitor wearing a hospital gown reportedly spoke to journalists outside the wrecked Brown Sugar Bar and Cafe, where he had been drinking the night before.

"I feel really lucky today," said the distraught man, who did not give his name, adding that doctors had removed shrapnel from his shoulder and his girlfriend suffered multiple fractures to her leg.

The six simultaneous blasts ripped through Saturday night crowds in bars and cafes in Hat Yai, the main tourist hub in the southern Thailand that has been gripped by a Muslim insurgency which has killed more than 1,400 people.

A Canadian tourist was among the latest dead, according to officials. A dead female mistakenly identified by medical staff as a Chinese tourist turned out later to be an ethnic minority from Chiang Mai, hospital officials said.

Health minister Pinit Jarusombat said 14 other foreigners were among the 72 wounded, and included six Malaysians, three Singaporeans, three Britons, an Indian and an American.

Paitoon Pattanasophon, police chief in Songkhla province, where Hat Yai is located, said police were holding emergency meetings during the morning as the hunt for suspects got under way.

Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra has ordered his deputies to work closely with police and military, his secretary said.

Police Lieutenant Colonel Prasit Paochoo said two explosive devices were planted inside motorcycles and detonated with a mobile phone.

The other four were planted near the entrances of two department stores and a hotel frequented by foreigners, he said, adding that police were still unsure what kind of bombs they were.

As dawn broke in the city, crowds of shocked onlookers gathered amid the wreckage. Walls were studded with shrapnel at the sites, which were covered with debris and pools of blood.

"I heard the blast and I live a kilometre away," said one bystander as others stood numbly on the edges of devastated restaurants.

Several charred vehicles lay in the road where they had burned the night before.

In the immediate aftermath of the blasts, Thai television showed bloodied victims lying in restaurants or being led to safety by rescue personnel as vehicles burned in streets, which were strewn with shattered glass and overturned tables and chairs.

One body was shown covered with a white sheet next to an overturned motorcycle as firemen tried to douse several blazing vehicles nearby.

Soon after the blasts, nearly 1,000 foreign and Thai tourists staying in hotels along Hat Yai's main road were evacuated, the Nation newspaper reported.

Hat Yai was also the victim of deadly insurgent violence in April 2005 when the city's airport was bombed, killing two people, and the city has been struggling to rebuild its tourism industry.

Parts of Songkhla province are under martial law as the Government struggles to contain an Islamic insurgency, and provincial governor Somporn Chaibangyang said the attacks would further damage Hat Yai's tourism sector, which is still recovering from the airport blasts.

"We need to work hard to regain our tourism," he said.

"Authorities have to work completely to prevent any violence from happening. But it is difficult to keep watching every single area, as wrongdoers will make violence in the area where they think they will have the most success," he said.

BANGKOK, Sept 17 (TNA) – Thailand's long-simmering insurgency intensified Saturday with the bombings in Hat Yai, and became inescapably internationalised with the first western casualty, a Canadian schoolteacher.

Defense Minister Gen. Thammarak Isarangura Na Ayutthaya Sunday flew to Hat Yai to inspect the scene of a series of bomb blasts Saturday night, to assess damage and demonstrate the urgency with which the government is viewing the situation in the south.

Gen. Thammarak will assist in investigating the incidents which killed four persons, including a 34-year-old Canadian schoolteacher Jesse Daniel, an English teacher at Hat Yai's Phol Vidhya School, and wounded 72 others.

Accompanied by Army Commander-in-Chief Gen. Sonthi Boonyaratkalin and Royal Thai Police chief Pol. Gen. Kowit Wattana, Defense Minister Thammarak told journalists before departing for Hat Yai that the bombers should be denounced because the explosions were planted in tourist areas and tarnished the country's image.

Gen. Thammarak also urged the public to denounce the act and cooperate with government officials to help suppress terrorism by the militants. He said he believed the explosions had nothing to do with Thailand's ongoing political turbulence.

Asked why the explosions could happen despite intelligence warning of possible attacks by the Gerakan Mujahidin Islam Pattani during the Sept 16-20 period to mark its anniversary, Gen. Thammarak said state security and the military are responsible for the three insurgency-troubled southern provinces of Pattani, Yala and Narathiwat, but police and the provincial governor are responsible for Hat Yai.

Local authorities have been focusing on important places such as railway stations and government offices.

Declining comment on the possibility of extending the emergency decree in Hat Yai, he said more detail needed to be studied.

The decree is now imposed in the three predominantly Muslim provinces and part of Songkhla province.